Chapter 9: The Criminal

The crowd had already scattered in panic, fleeing down the mountain at the sudden turn of events. Most had heard rumors of the shelter from those with slots, hoping for mercy from its guardians—only to be met with despair.

These were still the privileged of Northspire Haven, wealthy and influential, yet not wealthy enough. The true wretched were the oblivious masses below, unaware of the cataclysm.

Over half the city’s structures now lay in ruins, every human institution erased.

Lin Feng sat slumped on the cliff’s edge, watching the chaos subside. The sky blazed with pink clouds shredded by jet streams into calligraphic strokes. Soon, darkness reclaimed the basin as storm clouds gathered over Northspire Haven.

The mountain road’s gridlock had cleared. Lin Feng knew he couldn’t stay, though where to go remained unknown. First, a grim task awaited.

He trudged downhill, retrieved the pickup, and drove back up. The engine’s growl echoed alone—or would have, if Lin Feng could hear anything beyond the piercing tinnitus in his skull.

Parking, he stared vacantly toward Maeve Chen’s body. Dusk veiled the scene: her blood pooled darkly, now blooming with slime mold—velvety tendrils cradling her corpse. Her pallor glowed ghostly in the fading light, skin icy to his imagined touch.

Lin Feng buried his face in the steering wheel, fists pounding his thighs. Futile self-flagellation.

Soon, he forced himself to approach her. Maeve Chen’s expression held eerie peace, as if asleep. Lin Feng crouched, trembling, and peeled her from the ground—literally. The slime mold had fused her blood to the gravel, strands snapping like sinew as he lifted her.

He settled her into the passenger seat, buckling the belt. Madness flickered as he whispered, “Taking you home, Maeve.”

Her parents followed, still clutching their ID cards—cruel proof of their “citizenship.” The shelter’s entrance bore weathered engravings: People’s Air Defense Project, its paint long flaked away.

Rain pattered the roof as he descended, the cab’s silence clashing with the storm’s clamor.

Only one task consumed Lin Feng: bury Maeve Chen and her parents. The mountain road lay deserted now, vehicles long abandoned. He drove mechanically, swerving erratically, grief-blurred vision barely keeping the pickup from careening off cliffs. Divine intervention, perhaps, that he hadn’t yet died.

He thought nothing could pierce his numbness—until the SWAT-style armored vehicle materialized halfway down the slope. Its rear doors gaped open.

Odd. The evacuation convoy had vanished into the shelter, yet this functional beast sat discarded. Odder still: a figure inside.

The pickup crept closer. In the dusk, Lin Feng glimpsed a man hunched in the armored cabin—posture rigid, wrists glowing with electronic shackles’ crimson LEDs.

At the engine’s growl, the prisoner turned.

Late thirties, Lin Feng guessed, though the man’s wire-rimmed glasses and tailored suit suggested academia, not incarceration. His eyes held arctic detachment, as if the collapsing world were a mildly tedious lecture.

Their gazes locked—Lin Feng’s hollow, the stranger’s indifferent—each questioning if the other truly saw.

The man’s gaze shifted to the pickup’s other seats, ripples of emotion finally disturbing his glacial calm. Who drives with three corpses in their vehicle?

“BEEP-BEEP-BEEP—”

After a violent chime, the electronic shackles auto-released. Gears clinked, the restraints clattering to the armored vehicle’s floor.

Hunched over, the man emerged, straightening on the rear step. At full height, he towered over 185cm—his tailored suit barely containing muscular definition that clashed with his bookish veneer. A suit-clad brute.

Lin Feng’s foot hovered over the accelerator.

Leaning against the doorframe, the man spoke with cultivated politeness: “May I ask where this is?”

“Riverwatch Peak.”

“Current era?”

“The apocalypse.”

A nod, then a smirk. “Ah. Apocalypse.”

“You’re a criminal?” Lin Feng kept his tone guarded.

“By defunct human laws—yes. But laws require civilization.” The man adjusted his glasses. “Now? Merely a survivor.”

“What… did you do?”

Even those unwilling to answer reflexively formulate responses. The man’s pause stretched, his face flickering with excitement, sorrow, and mania—a toxic cocktail of remembrance.